In the Creative Space of Inclusion: Gender, Sexuality and Ethnicity in the Representations of Migrants in Norway

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ISBN 978-82-326-0608-5 (printed ver.) ISBN 978-82-326-0609-2 (electronic ver.) ISSN 1503-8181

Doctoral theses at NTNU, 2015:70

Jana Sverdljuk

In the Creative Space of Inclusion

Gender, Sexuality and Ethnicity in the Representations of Migrants in Norway

Doct or al thesis

Doctoral theses at NTNU, 2015:70Jana Sverdljuk NTNU Norwegian University ofScience and TechnologyThesis for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor Faculty of Humanities Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture

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Jana Sverdljuk

In the Creative Space of Inclusion

Gender, Sexuality and Ethnicity in the Representations of Migrants in Norway

Thesis for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor

Trondheim, December 2015

Norwegian University of Science and Technology Faculty of Humanities

Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture

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NTNU

Norwegian University of Science and Technology Thesis for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor Faculty of Humanities

Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture

ISBN 978-82-326-0608-5 (printed ver.) ISBN 978-82-326-0609-2 (electronic ver.) ISSN 1503-8181

Doctoral theses at NTNU, 2015:70

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Acknowledgements

Now that I have brought this painstaking but exciting work on the dissertation to its completion I would like to express my gratitude to all those who have been involved in it in one way or another. First of all I would like to thank all the interlocutors who shared their knowledge and were engaging conversation partners and sources of inspiration.

I am most grateful to my fantastic main supervisor Trine Annfelt and co-supervisor Berit Gullikstad who accepted me as a PhD student and followed my work right up to this day. Working together with them has been a privilege and an intellectual challenge.

They taught me that turning good ideas into convincing ideas is hard but ultimately rewarding work. They were excellent teachers in the technology of analytical thinking and got me to look way beyond the ordinary.

The work with the dissertation was part of the collaboration research project: “Experts and minorities in the land of gender equality”, financed by the Norwegian Research Council. In addition to my supervisors the team included Anne-Jorunn Berg and Tone Gunn Kristiansen (University of Nordland). Our project meetings in Trondheim and Bodø, academic discussions and informal conversations were inspiring and stimulating for my work. The intellectual atmosphere at the institute (KULT) and the seminars held within the Ethnicity, Gender and Equality group was exceptionally stimulating for innovative thinking. I would like to extend my warmest thanks to all institute colleagues, with a special thanks to the administration, Kari Bergmann, Camilla Bergmann Heitmann and Lotte Johanne Sæther, who have been reliable and irreplaceable assistants in solving practical issues.

The person who deserves my deepest thanks and appreciation is Aino Saarinen (University of Helsinki), the leader of the project: “RWN: Russian Women as Immigrants in Norden – Finland, Norway, Sweden – Gender Perspective on Everyday Life, Citizenship and Social Justice (RWN). Aino introduced me to Nordic feminism and supported my desire to conduct research in the social sciences after I had earned my

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Master’s degree in philosophy. Together with my project colleague Kestin Hägg (University of Umeå) we have become a friendly team participating in conferences together, sharing accommodations and travelling in the Nordic part of the Barents region. Thank you for your trust in my abilities, your patience and support!

I owe a great deal to the Centre for Gender Research (STK) at the University of Oslo.

Oddrun Rangsæter kindly offered me the possibility to use STK’s facilities when I was commuting between Trondheim and Oslo. I joined the scholarly discussions relevant for this dissertation when I was teaching a course on Feminism and Multiculturalism, and I am most grateful to Beatrice Halsaa for providing me with the opportunity to teach and learn through teaching. Thank you also to the leaders of STK, Harriet Bjerrum Nielsen and Jorunn Økland and to all the fantastic STK colleagues for the years of stimulating cooperation!

I had a scholarship at the Open University (Milton Keynes, UK) under the supervision of Gail Lewis. I am thankful to the Norwegian Research Council for making this scholarship possible and to the administration of the Open University for their warm welcome. Lewis’ comments on my work were extremely helpful.

During the completion of my dissertation, I started working at the National Library of Norway. I am grateful to my colleagues for their understanding and moral support. I really appreciate the inspiring conversations with Eivind Røssaak and his valuable comments on my text. I also would like to express my gratitude to John Anthony for his work on the improvement of the English. And last but not least, I extend a big thank to all my friends from different parts of the world and to my family, especially to my mother Kornelia and my sister Ludmila. You have supported me and helped with advice when I needed it.

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Abstract

This doctoral dissertation explores the way in which welfare state professionals and authorities, NGO employees and social work students in Norway represent migrants – Russian women and men from Africa and the Middle East – with regard to gender, sexuality and ethnicity. The main objective of the thesis is to explore whether the representations of migrants generate a tendency towards processes of inclusion or exclusion and marginalisation with respect to Norwegian society. In terms of theory, it draws on the cultural theory of representation (Hall 1997), the Foucaultian concept of subject position (Foucault 1972, 1980) and the post-colonial, post-structuralist feminist theory of intersectionality (Berg et al. 2010; Brah 2003; Lykke 2003, 2005; Staunæs and Søndergaard 2006). I argue that professionals tend to represent migrants as ‘traditional’:

‘migrant women in need of liberation’ and ‘foreign macho-men’. That positions persons defined as ‘migrants’ as ‘others’, and lays the grounds for their symbolic and potentially material exclusion from Norway’s ‘gender equal’ society. The analyses presents also the way in which, professionals and migrants (more specifically, Russian women living in northern Norway) transform these problematic gendered and sexualised representations and define migrants as ‘transnational caring fathers’ and ‘career women, living in harmonious families’. The research encourages us to revisit theories of inclusion within liberal feminism, the philosophy of multiculturalism and mainstream policy making.

Concerns about the gender equality of migrants eclipse such political issues as distant parenting, the push of migrant women to the care sector of the economy and restrictive regulations of family reunification.

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List of publications

Sverdljuk, J. (2009) “Contradicting the ‘Prostitution Stigma’: Narratives of Russian Migrant Women Living in Norway”. In Keskinen, S. Irni, S. Mulinari. D. and Tuori, S.

(eds) Complying with Colonialism: Gender, ‘Race’ and Ethnicity in the Nordic Region.

Aldershot: Ashgate: 137–154.

Sverdljuk, J. (2010) “Russian Women-Immigrants in the Nordic Countries: Finland, Norway, Sweden. Gender Perspectives on Social Justice”. In Oleksy, E. H., Hearn, J.

and Golaska, D. (eds) The Limits of Gendered Citizenship: Contexts and Complexities.

Routledge: 226–244.

Sverdljuk, J. (2012) “Traditional Foreign Femininities? Experts’ Stories About Helping Russian Migrant Women who are Victims of Domestic Violence”. In Saarinen, A. and Calloni, M. (eds) Builders of a New Europe. Women Immigrants from the Eastern Trans-Regions. Aleksanteri Papers 1/2012 (online). Helsinki: Kikimora Publications:

80–95.

Sverdljuk, J. (2014) “Trans-National Caring Masculinity: Towards Inclusive Social Counselling”. NORMA, International Journal for Masculinity Studies 9/2: 126–140.

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In the last 50 years, migration to Norway has increased significantly, changing the demographic map of the country and enriching its ethnic diversity. In 2014, there were 633,100 persons with a migrant background in Norway and 126,100 persons who were born in Norway to foreign parents. These two groups, altogether, comprise 13 per cent of the total population.¹ The majority of migrants are from Europe (predominantly Poland, Sweden and Germany; that is, EU countries), and less than half of the migrant population has an Asian, African or Latin American background. As many authors have argued, although Norway has strict immigration policies, extensive measures are taken to promote the integration of migrants (International Migration 2009–2010 SOPEMI- report for Norway: 5–6). The concept of universal inclusion is at the centre of state policies on the empowerment of migrants.

In Norway, social democratic welfare state policies of the inclusion of new arrivals have developed as a continuation of the main efforts of the welfare state to provide conditions for equal economic and social participation for all (Brochmann and Hagelund 2005). In line with this, efforts have been made to diminish the differences in living conditions between migrants and the rest of the population and to ensure equal opportunities for immigrants and their children (International Migration 2009–2010 SOPEMI-report for Norway: 7). The Norwegian political social democratic model of inclusion echoes a widespread political discourse of social inclusion that has been developing in Europe since the late 1980s. The larger European discourse on inclusion refers to equal participation in: formal citizenship rights; the labour market; civil society; and social arenas (Aasland and Fløtten 2001: 1028; Guiraudon 2002; Silver 1994; Rawal 2008). It has emerged in the context of the crisis of the welfare state; in many instances, it has replaced the discourse surrounding the concepts of poverty and marginalisation (Rawal 2008). In Norway, the conception of inclusion as the provision of equal opportunity for economic empowerment developed not as a result of an existing crisis, but rather as a continuation of the historical success of the social rights movement (Brochmann and

1 http://ssb.no/innvandring-og-innvandrere/nokkeltall (accessed 14.09.2015).

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Hagelund 2005). In line with this understanding, in the white paper presented by the centre-right Bondevik government in 2004, ‘Inclusion and participation’ (S.meld.nr 49 2003–2004), and in the subsequent policy efforts of the centre-left Stoltenberg government, the main emphasis was on social and community cohesion, employment and belonging (S.meld.nr 6 2012–2013: ‘A coherent integration policy’).

To summarise, the Norwegian government emphasises economic and cultural – or identity-based – dimensions of inclusion in its policy making. As to the cultural dimension, in the Norwegian government’s view, community cohesion is a result of the common process of negotiation in regards to the central values of democratic procedure, human rights and gender equality (S.meld.nr 49 2003–2004: 61). A special emphasis is made on the value of gender equality. In Norway, gender equality is high on the political agenda. The country is known for the success of its women’s movement and its well-developed policies of ‘state feminism’. It is internationally known as a ‘female friendly’ welfare state (Esping-Andersen 2002; Hernes 1987; Skjeie 2013). The policies of state feminism have developed as part of the general inclination of the Norwegian social democratic state to have an active role in providing citizens with the conditions for a good life. The state interferes actively in people’s private sphere and promotes gender equality in all aspects of social life (through so-called gender mainstreaming policies). In accordance with this principle, the state is considered to have a normative function as an actor in the multicultural society. In this respect, the government believes, in line with Okin (1999), that it should regulate certain ‘unwise or oppressive’

practices that may result from a ‘lack of knowledge’ (S.meld.nr 49 2003–2004: 47;

Stokke 2012: 50).

The formation of gender equality policies in multicultural Norway has been studied by Annfelt and Gullikstad (2013). These authors have analysed the recent Norwegian official reports, action plans and white papers on gender equality and found that, today, the gender sensitive policy of social integration is clearly divided into two parts. On the one hand, there are measures that basically target ‘native’ women, promoting their social and economic empowerment and economic independence and supporting gender affirmative action within leadership positions. On the other hand, a ‘special’ corpus of

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gender equality policies has been formed that basically targets migrant women. These policies concentrate on the ‘gender education’ of migrant women (Annfelt and Gullikstad 2013; Midtbøen and Teigen 2013) and are often guided by the argument that migrant women must step away from their traditional lifestyles and engage in paid work.

While pursuing the idea of a common deliberation about values, Norwegian officials strive to give freedom to civil society; they do not want to interfere, but rather wish to support people’s ‘multiculture’. In this context, the government acknowledges

‘individual diversity’ – complex identities and ‘multiple ways of being Norwegian’

(S.meld.nr 49 2003–2004: 33; Stokke 2012: 49)). In line with Gressgård (2010) and Stokke (2012: 50), one could ask whether social cohesion and the facilitation of inclusion in this discourse actually is a goal in itself, or attempts to increase loyalty to shared values. Are individual difference and people’s ‘multiculture’ associated with a lack of knowledge about democracy and gender equality? In this context, the question of how responsible actors represent migrants in terms of gender, sexuality and ethnicity is not inessential. Representations of migrants influence the way in which policies are formed: which measures are highlighted as most important and which political issues are prioritised to facilitate migrants’ inclusion into society.

The discussion about the inclusion of migrants occurs in different venues and in various contexts of professional practice: within official policy making, at the state level, within the welfare state institutions and within the civil – or NGO – sector. Professional practitioners who work within state and non-governmental institutions can be seen as gatekeepers of inclusion who interact with migrants in their everyday practice. They are guided by official policies of inclusion, on the one hand, but, on the other hand, many have a degree of freedom to form their practice in accordance with the specificity of each concrete situation. In this dissertation, I investigate the representations of migrants made by professionals who are responsible for promoting inclusion in Norway – those who support individuals’ economic and social empowerment. In consideration of the fact that ideas about gender are important in Norwegian society, I inquire into the way in which professionals represent migrants in terms of gender, sexuality and ethnicity

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while using the discursive resources available to them within policy making, the media and everyday social interactions. What subject positions within the discourse on inclusion do these representations create for migrants? What occurs within migrants’

‘multiculture’? How do migrants represent themselves when they deploy the categories of gender, sexuality and ethnicity?

To summarise, I investigate:

x how the professionals represent migrants in relation to gender, sexuality and ethnicity;

x what kinds of subject positions within the discourse on inclusion these representations create for migrants;

x what alternative representations migrants are able to produce in this context;

and

x which subject positions migrants seem to occupy.

How does the study of the representations of migrants in different contexts and venues inform our reading of the ongoing political and theoretical discussions on inclusion and the entitlement of migrants with special, cultural rights (Kymlicka 1995, 2002; Okin 1999)?

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Research on gender and ethnicity in professional practices

Representations of migrants in terms of gender and ethnicity produced by journalists, politicians and professional practitioners have been a special target of criticism within post-colonial feminist scholarship in the Nordic countries. In the Nordic countries, research conducted within varying professional contexts has shown that progressive practice of gender relations is associated with being ethnically Finnish, Swedish or Norwegian (Gullikstad 2010; Tuori 2009; Vuori 2009; Yang 2009). Migrants from countries outside the West are represented as those who follow traditional gender roles.

Feminist scholars who are inspired by post-colonial feminist theory have argued that the discourse on Western countries as ‘societies of gender equality’ and representations of migrants as ‘traditional’ have a marginalising effect in regards to positions of women and men with ethnic minority backgrounds (Berg et al. 2010; Gullikstad 2010;

Gullikstad et al. 2002; Keskinen et al. 2009; Mohanty 1988; Razack 2008). As several researchers have argued, as a result of making linkages between gender equality and the majority ethnicity, cultural minorities have been constructed as ‘others’ who are not capable of living up to the progressive and democratic ideal of equality between the sexes (Jacobsen and Skilbrei 2010; Keskinen 2009; Mohanty 1988; Mulinari et al.

2009). According to Nordic post-colonial feminists, Western majority women’s self- definition as ‘liberated’ in terms of gender results in a representation of other cultures as

‘exotic’, and considers ethnic minority and migrant women as ‘victims of a patriarchal order of life’, weak, dependent and unable to display agency (Gressgård and Jacobsen 2002; Jacobsen and Skilbrei 2010; Jacobsen and Stenvoll 2010).

In the Norwegian context, feminist scholars who are inspired by post-colonial feminist theory have argued that the idea of Norway as a ‘country of gender equality’

symbolically marginalises migrants (Annfelt and Gullikstad 2013; Berg et al. 2010;

Gullikstad 2010; Gullikstad et al. 2002; Jacobsen and Skilbrei 2010). For example, Gulliskstad focused on gender and ethnicity in the study of the representations of foreign nurses. Recruiting foreigners into Norwegian working life is a priority of integration policies. As a result of linkages between gender equality and the majority ethnicity, foreign nurses are positioned as ‘others’ who do not correspond to the representation of an ‘ideal nurse’ (Gullikstad 2010). In other Norwegian research

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involving the employees of women’s NGOs – which protect the rights of foreign sex workers – Jacobsen and Skilbrei criticised the tendencies towards victimisation of migrant women prostitutes. The idea of ‘gender equal Norwegian women’ was interpreted as a liberal attitude to sexuality. According to these researchers, Norwegian majority women’s self-definition as ‘liberated’ results in a representation of foreign prostitutes as ‘victims of a patriarchal order of life’ in their home countries, weak, dependent and unable to display agency (Gressgård and Jacobsen 2002; Jacobsen and Skilbrei 2010; Jacobsen and Stenvoll 2010).

The researchers included in the Norwegian anthology edited by Leseth and Solbrække (2011) are especially concerned about what impact the clichéd gendered representations of migrants has on their ability to exercise professions (e.g. Debesay 2011).

Professionals are seen as mediators of the universal value of inclusion, which occupies a key position in the Norwegian welfare state’s ideology of integration (Neumann 2011).

Several studiespointed out that gendered and racialised prejudices prevent professionals from securing the well-being of migrant ‘users’ (Debesay 2011; Neumann 2011).

Gendered clichés connected to migrants explain why professionals fail to hear the voices of the actual people; that is, why they fail to understand migrants’ problems and needs.

In the Danish context, Nanna Brink Larsen studied parental education as conducted by social workers as an activity intended to integrate minority Danes into Danish society.

She analysed the interaction of these professionals with the Arabic speaking mothers, noting that the mothers were positioned unfavourably as passive, suppressed and domestic Oriental women with little education (Larsen 2009: 234). The researcher introduced the concept of ‘institutional nationalism’ to imply that Danes are united as one nation and developed a common identity based on similar experiences of dealing with institutions. Being ethnically Danish becomes particularly fit for being active in institutions that carry values of humanist and egalitarian pedagogy, gender equality and participatory democracy. The association of Danish-ness with these democratic institutions is combined with the Orientalisation of Arabic speaking women and constrains her status as an agent.

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In the Finnish context, Tuori (2009) conducted an inquiry into the work of welfare state professionals and NGOs that promote social participation and economic empowerment for migrant families, and especially migrant women. Tuori noted that being Finnish is associated with romantic love, tolerance towards homosexuality and gender equal families, and this leads to positioning of migrant families as ‘different’. Migrant women are seen as exotic, and, for this reason, Finnish workers in NGOs do not manage to hear how migrant women reflect on their families. The researcher concluded that discussions about the problems confronted by migrant families are often intertwined with racism.

Another Finnish researcher, Vuori (2009), critically analysed the way in which gender issues and ethnicity are intertwined in representations of migrants when she studied education during their integration into Finnish society. Vuori studied guidebooks produced for migrants and professionals, focusing especially on cases in which gender was dealt with. Vuori asked how ‘Finnishness’ and other ethnic identities were produced in the provision of information to migrants. Vuori (2009) showed that migrant women were considered receivers of information and actors only within the family.

Brochures addressed gender equality as an achieved reality among Finns.

In the Swedish context, Paulina de los Reyes (1998) studied the positions of migrant women in the labour market and pointed to the problems related to the construction of the category ‘migrant woman’, which is associated with culture. Another Swedish researcher, Chi-Ling Yang, examined how the topic of gender equality was presented to migrant women in a feminist adult educational institution (Kvinnofolksskolan). She pointed out that the Swedish teachers were especially critical towards the Muslim religion and did not pay attention to the heterosexual ideology that is pervasive in the Bible. Chi-Ling Yang argued that, in such feminist discussions, the Swedish law represents a certain ‘Swedishness’ and is linked with democracy, while the Koran is represented as ‘backward’ with ‘notorious polygyny’ (Yang 2009: 248). The fact that homosexuality is not fully accepted in Swedish society was not made a topic for discussion. In other research, conducted by Tina Mattsson, on social worker’s discourses in Sweden, migrants were constructed as a homogeneous cultural group whose members shared common characteristics – such as a lack of knowledge of

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gender equality – that were seen as necessary for inclusion into the Swedish welfare system (Mattsson 2010).

To conclude, these Nordic inquiries, which were inspired by post-colonial theory, have shown that in various professional practices in the Nordic Countries there are tendencies towards the discursive marginalisation of migrants. The researchers cited above concentrated on a select set of materials and select examples of professional practice within various welfare state institutions (e.g. Neumann 2011; Debesay 2011). However, not enough attention has been paid to studying, how the gendered representations of migrants influence the process of inclusion across different professions and in various arenas of professional interaction with migrants. Besides, migrants’ accounts of gender, sexuality and ethnicity have not been explored to a satisfactory degree. Furthermore, the vast majority of researchers have pointed out that migrants are marginalised due to the discourse on ‘gender equal Western women and men’ (Debesay 2011; Neumann 2011;

Tuori 2009; Vuori 2009; Yang 2009). Less attention has been paid to exploring gendered and ethnicity in representations that position migrants as full-fledged members of society. The current study aims at broadening the existing research on gender, sexuality and ethnicity in professional practice. It includes different perspectives:

professional, political, media and migrant accounts, with a special emphasis on professional accounts. It enriches the spectrum of interpretative strategies by concentrating on not only ‘hegemonic’ representations, but also alternative representations. Furthermore, it analyses different kinds of data, such as interviews, observations and texts.

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Thesis overview

The thesis proceeds as follows. In the chapter ‘Presentation of articles: Inclusion of migrants in various contexts and venues’, the main empirical results are briefly summarised, as are the main theoretical concepts that were used in the analysis. In the chapter ‘Analytical tools: Gender, sexuality and ethnicity in representation’, the theoretical tools and concepts used to inquire into migrants’ representations and self- presentations are explicated. In the chapter ‘Making subjects – Delineating political views’, I discuss the main empirical findings of the research in light of the explicated concepts and theories. Further, I present the materials and methodology applied in this thesis. The four articles are printed in Appendix 1. The interview guides are presented in Appendix 2.

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Articles overview: Representations of migrants in different contexts and venues

The main body of my research consists of four articles. In the articles, representations of migrants in various venues and with various actors as the main contributors are studied.

Professional, political, media and migrant accounts are taken into consideration, though a special emphasis is placed on professional accounts. The first three articles analyse the work or education of professionals in different venues and in the various situations in which they encounter migrants. These articles focus on different cases of professional practice: when professionals consult migrants in regards to issues of employment, the prevention of family conflict and domestic violence, housing and young people’s social well-being. Thus, the articles explore the discourses and practice of the employees of the employment agencies as they offer assistance to those suffering from employment problems (Article 1: Sverdljuk 2010). The practice of crisis centre employees and the police – institutions at the margins of the welfare system – and their contribution to the development of measures aimed at preventing domestic violence against migrant women is the object of study in Article 2 (Sverdljuk 2012). In Article 3 (Sverdljuk 2014), I study education in multicultural social work and analyse students’ professional practice when mediating social conflict at a multicultural youth club. Here, I also analyse professional training for assisting refugees with housing problems. In addition, Article 4 explores the gendered self-representation of migrants, wherein Russian women discuss various aspects of their lives: work, family, leisure and intimate relations (Sverdljuk 2009). In the articles, different interpretative strategies are used to show the existence of dominant and alternative representations of migrants. These interpretative strategies are explicated in the theory part of this dissertation: ‘Analytical tools: Gender, sexuality and ethnicity in representation’. Studying the practices of different actors allowed me to ask questions and draw conclusions in regards to common trends in the representation of migrants. Furthermore, I was able to identify discursive tendencies that occur as part of professionals’ negotiations and interpretations of the political idea of inclusion. These common trends and tendencies are shown in the last part: ‘Making subjects – Delineating political views’.

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1. ‘Russian women immigrants in the Nordic countries: Finland, Norway, Sweden – gender perspectives on social justice’

This article analyses the integration process of Russian women immigrants into the welfare system and labour market. It focuses especially on professional practices of assistance in migrant employment and explores the cultural representations of Russian women migrants. The data consists of interviews with immigrant women and professionals. Particularly in Norway, I interviewed employees of Aetat², especially those responsible for the implementation of introduction programs. In addition, I studied the immigration and integration policies in Norway and compared these with similar polices in Sweden and Finland. Representations of migrants as ‘less advanced’ relative to native citizens were typical among professionals. The interviewed women, themselves, criticised the way in which their participation in educational integration measures turned into ‘a never-ending process of self-improvement’ that did not help them access the labour market and become economically independent. Migrant women were represented as subjects under supervision – those in need of additional education to be included in Nordic labour markets. Therefore, the article shows that it is legitimate to talk about the phenomenon of ‘structural discrimination’ (de los Reyes 2006) – that is, the consequent discrimination of migrants by professionals – based on the idea of cultural difference. The cultural constructions of migrant women as ‘subjects under supervision’ are examples of discourses based on gender and ethnicity that produce vulnerable social positions for Russian migrant women. The study shows that any difficulties the women experienced, including those connected to economic or other structural problems, were interpreted as ‘family problems’. Constructed as ‘less advanced’, the migrant women were pushed to the periphery of the labour market in low-paid or unstable positions that are traditionally associated with women.

In addition, Russian women experienced injustices in the private sphere conditioned by the restrictive policies of immigration and family reunification (especially the so-called

2Aetat was a state agency in Norway responsible for the implementation of labour market policy. In 2006, it was discontinued. Its functions have since been overtaken by NAV, a joint agency for labour and welfare in Norway.

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‘three years rule’³). Family reunification policies and the so-called ‘three years rule’

position migrant women as ‘others’ in relation to the celebrated (in the Nordic countries) policies of gender equality. Gender equality policies are uncritically associated with majority women, whereas migrant women find themselves partially outside the system of social protection. To emphasise the connection between economic injustice and the cultural sphere of representation (based on gender and ethnicity), I point to Fraser’s concepts of symbolic and economic justice (Fraser 1997) and, in particular, Fraser’s distinction between ‘symbolic’ categories of gender and ethnicity and the ‘real’ category of class (Fraser 1997). The article concludes that it is necessary to revisit conceptions of justice and inclusion that are based on an idea of the nation- state, as these imply nationalist tendencies. It highlights the fact that individual and group identities are heterogeneous and plural.

2. ‘Traditional foreign femininities? Experts’ stories about helping Russian migrant women who are victims of domestic violence’

This article analyses interviews with Norwegian experts who were working with victims of domestic violence. It explores the interplay of gender and ethnicity in these expert’s representations of Russian migrant women. Russian women were constructed as

‘traditional’ subjects who had internalised ‘patriarchal rules’, whereas Norwegian women and men were seen as ‘gender equal’, ‘modern’ and ‘progressive’. In addition, the article analyses some media texts about a murder as a case study for this kind of discourse. The author shows that the same discourse can be deployed when the male perpetrator of violence is Norwegian. In such cases, the male perpetrator is represented as an individual no Norwegian woman would marry, and a Russian woman is presented as ending up in a relationship with such a man due to her economic difficulties, traditional femininity and sexual submissiveness.

The main argument is that the stigmatising and one-sided gendered representations of migrant women from Russia do not allow experts to pay attention to the structural inequalities (stemming from discriminating legislation such as the ‘three years rule’)

3 In Norway, a foreign spouse does not have the right of abode in a country after divorce, if this occurs within three years of marriage.

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that lead to the situation of abuse. At the centre of attention is criticism of the hidden ethnocentrism in experts’ practices. I use Crenshaw’s (1991) idea that gender violence is conditioned by the structural (class and legislative) discrimination of migrant women, rather than problems of patriarchy within the migrant environment. An example of institutional discrimination is the ‘three years rule’, which positions migrant women in legal dependency on their Norwegian partners. The article claims that it is necessary to pay attention to the structural inequalities and economic and legislative difficulties that migrant women encounter in their host countries.

3. ‘Trans-national caring masculinity: Towards inclusive social counselling’

This article studies gendered representations of migrant men in the professional practice of students of ‘multicultural’ social work and the impact of these representations on professional discourses of ‘worthy help’. Two examples are looked at closely:

educational practice at a multinational youth club and a practical exercise in a classroom (a role play about assisting a refugee in solving housing questions). I proceed from the idea of Connell (2005) and Kimmel (2000) that masculinities are gendered and plural subject positions. I argue that, in Norway, masculinities are defined in relation to the way in which men participate in the gender equality project. The main finding is twofold. First, the discourse on gender equality in Norway contributes to the construction of a symbolically marginalised subject position of a migrant man. The discourse on gender equality in the Nordic countries, and especially the idea of

‘Norwegian kind fathers’ who are loyal to gender equality, serves as a mechanism for constructing migrant men as patriarchal ‘others’. This produces limitations on the professional ability to provide ‘worthy help’. Second, by using the ‘open’ approach to intersectionality, I was able to show that the professionals also overcame derogative representations of migrant men. There are alternative gendered constructions of migrant men. When recognising difference (i.e. the diversity of and divergence in doing gender), the students created new, symbolically accepted representations of migrant men as

‘caring transnational fathers’. In this case, the idea of gender equality was not strictly related to the Nordic contract of parity in childcare responsibilities, and involved – among other things – distant fathering. The migrant user was constructed as both

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belonging to the ‘other’ ethnic and cultural group and being part of the socially endorsed contract of gender justice. Acceptance of migrant men as ‘good fathers’ had positive implications on the discourses and practices of ‘worthy help’. A shift occurred in the practice of inclusion (from partial to full inclusion). Students destabilised the dominant tendency to link the idea of gender equality with the specific ways of doing gender associated with the majority ethnicity. As a result, they showed flexibility in approaching the formal mandate of a social worker allowing male users to send a portion of their social assistance money to their families abroad.

4. ‘Contradicting the ‘prostitution stigma’: Narratives of Russian migrant women living in Norway’

This article explores Russian migrant women’s gendered self-representations, which were created in dialogue with, and in opposition to, the popular discourse on ‘Russian women as prostitutes’. The ‘stigma of prostitution’ is approached as the societal gendered discourse that leads to the production of symbolically devalued representations of Russian migrant women. It is based on the widespread idea of respectable Norwegian femininity, which is gender equal, liberal, but not ‘too accessible’ (Jacobsen and Stenvoll 2010). The process of Russian women’s ‘speaking back’, which can be understood as a result of individual and collective efforts of resistance, is explored (Spivak 1985, 1988). In the background of the analysis is a social constructivist theory of identity formation, according to which self-presentations are constructed in constant dialogue with prevailing societal discourses (Honneth 2007). I use a post-colonial feminist perspective to study the construction of subject positions and ask how discourses on gender and multiculturalism participate in defining Russian migrant women as devalued, yet accepted members of society (Laclau and Mouffe 1985; Lykke 2005).

To oppose the ‘prostitution stigma’, the Russian women presented themselves as

‘woman on the move’ who were actively spending their leisure time and who had come to Norway to create a family, study and work. They said that they had supportive husbands, a happy family life and a conscious attitude to sexuality. Their self- representations were complex and heterogeneous, and were both similar to and different

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from the Nordic ideal of gender relations. They modified the understandings of the heterosexual gender equal (Norwegian) family, wherein equality is approached in terms of parity, introducing a loose idea of ‘harmony’ – or ‘balance’ – in family life. When challenging derogative attitudes, the dominant discourses of Russian women displayed agency as a capacity to question dominant discourses and social norms.

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Analytical tools: Gender, sexuality and ethnicity in representation In this chapter, I present the main theoretical concepts and methodological tools that guided my analysis. To explore the way in which professionals represent migrants in terms of gender, sexuality and ethnicity and what discursive positions these

representations offer for migrant subjects, I used the socio-constructivist theory of representation (Hall 1997a, 1997b), Foucaultian notions of subject position and social exclusion (Foucault 1972, 1980) and the post-structuralist theory of intersectionality (Berg et al. 2010; Brah 2003; Larsen 2006; Lykke 2003, 2005; Staunæs 2004; Staunæs and Søndergaard 2006).

In particular, I deployed the discursive concept of representation, which was developed within cultural studies by Stuart Hall (1997a, 1997b). Hall pointed to the constructed, discursive and arbitrary nature of the representation. According to Hall, meanings and connotations, which we prescribe to the objects of representations, can be written into different discourses and mean ‘anything anytime’ (Hall 1997c). Hall and post-colonial theory mainly theorised the historical construction of people as racialised beings. I supplement Hall’s theory of representation – which was in many ways influenced by Foucault – with Foucaultian ideas about the subject, subject positions and social exclusion (Foucault 1970, 1982). This was done to emphasise the fact that

representations of groups and individuals (human subjects) impact the symbolic and material status of those groups/individuals in society. Foucault’s theory holds that the meaning of a subject is double: on the one hand, a subject has a self-relation; on the other hand, she/he is positioned discursively or represented by others. Therefore, representations can be bestowed on subjects by more powerful groups in society; the representation of a group is never free from power and political interests. In line with Foucault (1980), I emphasise the notion of agency and the idea that representation is a dramatic act through which the power of social convention can be challenged. Foucault was mainly interested in the effects of the discourse of modernity and heterosexuality, which offers the major representations and constructions of the subject as a rational, moral and heterosexual being.

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At the same time, Foucaultian and Hall’s ideas about the construction of subject through discourse and representation have been further developed within the post-structuralist theory of intersectionality – introduced within a particular strain of post-colonial feminism (Berg et al. 2010; Brah 2003; Larsen 2006; Lykke 2003, 2005; Staunæs 2004;

Staunæs and Søndergaard 2006).It offers analytical tools for exploring the

representation of individuals and groups as a result of an interaction of the signifiers as gender, ethnicity and sexuality (Larsen 2006; Staunæs and Søndergaard 2006). In line with Hall (1997a, 1997b) and Foucault (1972, 1980), post-structuralist intersectionality suggests that the researcher should be sensitive to the concrete and situation-conditioned interplay of signifiers or categories in representation. This theory accents agency and resistance and offers theoretical methods for investigating the formation of

representations of vulnerable social groups that are changeable and situation- conditioned.

Discursive theory of representation

I used the socio-constructivist and post-structuralist theory of representation as a starting point for theorising how to study representations of migrant subejcts based on several categories of belonging, such as ethnicity, sexuality and gender. According to the cultural theory of representation put forward by Hall (1997a), representation is an act of giving meaning to a thing, an event or a group. It is an indirect mediation through which our mental idea about something is expressed by using a so-called signifier – a sign or a word that enters into complex relations with other value-laden signs. In the act of representation, we actively interpret reality ‘out there’ using various cultural means of expression: words, images and signs. Culture has, therefore, a decisive force in ordering the world (Hall 1997a). Representation actively interprets the mental concept of a thing, i.e. the object of representation.

In my research I have used this basic socio-constructivist idea in relation to studying representation of individuals and groups, or human subjects. To social constructivists, there is no stable metaphysical ‘core’ from which people operate and make sense of themselves and others (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1982). Rather, the linguistic and cultural processes of meaning creation or representation construct subjects. According to Hall,

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one of the central principles of representation is thinking in binary oppositions, or producing differences. In relation to individuals and groups, production of differences is based on categories of social belonging (Hall 1997a, 1997b). Thus, subjects – or humans – are classified according to categories of social belonging as, for example, man–woman; Norwegian–Russian; Muslim–Christian; or heterosexual–homosexual.

According to Hall, this is the first level of representation, or the procedure of denotation (Hall 1997a).

Further, Hall highlights the discursive and historically-conditioned nature of the representation of individuals and groups. According to Hall, representation is never neutral, it always contains a level of connotation and implicit judgement about a thing, human being or group, and these connotations and judgements position subjects (individuals and groups) in a certain way in a social and cultural universe. Hall pointed out that, at the level of connotation, wider cultural and historical myths or discourses are activated (Hall 1997a). Objects of representation classified as ‘man’, ‘woman’,

‘Norwegian’ or ‘Russian’ absorb certain meanings or connotations as they are placed within discursive storylines or become ‘heroes’ within wider historical myths and valid political ideologies. Hall suggested a discursive concept of representation grounded in Foucault’s theory of power/knowledge (Hall 1997a, 2001).

Foucault launched the term ‘discourse’ as a system of representation, consistently understood as a practice implemented in a socio-cultural, historical context and inseparable from it (Foucault 1972). According to Foucault, discourses are ‘practices that systematically form the objects of which they speak’ (Foucault 1972: 49). In our case, the ‘objects’ of representation are human subjects. Discourses are embodied in

‘socialised’ speech patterns; it may work below the level of ‘common sense’ and govern our perceptions. Discourse is a group of statements which provide a language for talking about a particular topic at a particular historical moment. As Hall underlines, for Foucault discourse constructs the topic. It defines and produces the objects of our knowledge. It governs the way that a topic can be meaningfully talked about and reasoned about (Hall 1997a: 29).

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When guided by the post-structuralist insights of Foucault, Hall was especially interested in the way in which the category ‘race’ has been interpreted as part of the discourse of Orientalism and the historical practices of colonization. As he points out, throughout the history of culture, racial difference has been loaded with certain meanings (Hall 1997b). When reviewing the history of Western culture, Hall traced the emergence and transformation of the specific derogative representation of a ‘negro’

(who is ‘lazy’, ‘unintelligent’, ‘strong’ and ‘close to nature’) – a racialised representation that was formed within a discourse of Orientalism and the historic practice of colonisation. According to Hall, this representation often has sexual connotations, i.e. it is combined with sexism (Hall 1997b). When critically addressing the discourse of Orientalism formed in the run of history, Hall pointed out that this discourse produces – through different practices of representation – a form of racialised knowledge about the ‘other’ that is deeply implicated in the operation of power (imperialism) (Hall 1997b). Similarly, feminism has questioned the historical representation of women as irrational, weak and close to nature, which naturalises rationality and strength as men’s possession. For example, de Beauvoir pointed out that, historically, women have been positioned within the discourse of patriarchy, as the masculinist society’s ‘others’ (de Beauvoir 1992). As an illustration, the institution of the family has been historically formed as a part of the discourse of patriarchy, as a place for reproducing gender in terms of heteronormativity, constantly recreating certain sexist representations of women.

Although Hall’s theory mainly serves to expose stigmatising and devaluing representations of subjects within the discourse of Orientalism, he held a post- structuralist position, believing that subjects can be represented differently in various contexts. According to Hall, we can fix difference in the categories that prescribe certain qualities to subjects and groups. Alternatively, difference can be interpreted in many various ways. Categories, which signify our mental concepts of and construct meaning about individuals and groups, can be written into different discourses and mean ‘anything anytime’ (Hall 1997c). Culture and human history offer a variety of myths and discourses, and potentially all of these can be activated in the procedure of representation. When referring to the social category of ‘race’, Hall notes that difference

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in regards to race exists; the question is what we make out of it (Hall 1997b). He points out that ‘race’ is a floating signifier (Hall 1997c); the word is more concrete than the concept it describes – race may mean whatever one wants it to mean. ‘Race’ is a signifier that can be linked to other signifiers in a representation. Its meaning is

relational, and it is constantly subject to redefinition in different cultures and at different moments. There is always a certain sliding of meaning – always something left unsaid (Hall 1997c). For example, according to Hall, race can e.g. also mean eroticism (Hall 1997b).

Subject positions

To further explain the socio-constructivist and discursive theory of representation of individuals and groups presented by Hall (1997a), it is important draw in Foucault’s concepts of subject and subject positions. Following the ideas of Hall (1997a) and Foucault (1972, 1980), one can say that when being represented in certain ways individuals and groups are offered specific positions within various discourses.

Foucault’s theory holds that the meaning of a subject is double: on the one hand, a subject has self-relation and a psychological dimension; on the other hand, she/he is positioned discursively by others (Foucault 1980). In this respect it is important to keep in mind the distinction between the terms ‘subject’ and ‘subject position’. Subject positions point to multiple social characteristics that might be prescribed to a subject. At the same time subject involves a psychological dimension that should be theorised in its own terms – a capacity of giving carte blanche to, refusing, or modifying social categorisation. In this context, Smith (2003) wrote:

Understood from a psychoanalytic perspective, the ‘subject’ is not the same as

‘subject positions.’ With the psychoanalytic concept of the subject as a subject of lack, we have the principle of the impossibility of identity, for ‘every identity is already in itself blocked’/…/ With subject positions, by contrast, we

emphasize the ways in which identity plays an interpretative, mediating role - albeit in necessarily imperfect and incomplete forms—in the incitement of certain practices in specific historical contexts /…/ an emphasis on both dimensions is needed. Subject position theory without the principle of the impossibility of identity could become just another version of functionalism,

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while the psychoanalytic concept of subjectivity on its own tends to disregard the ways in which social agents are constructed within historically specific networks of power relations /…/’ (Smith 2003: 78)

Foucault underlined his belief that subjects are constituted as they take on certain

‘identities’ or positions, subjugating themselves to discourses. If subjects take a position from which a discourse makes sense, they subject themselves to its power and

knowledge (Hall 1997a: 56). To explicate the meaning of a subject as someone who is discursively positioned and represented by others, Foucault pointed out that one cannot meaningfully communicate outside the discourse (Foucault 1972, 1980). Our self- definitions and identities depend on the discourses and storylines we subject ourselves to (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1982; Lock and Strong 2014). According to Davies and Harré (1990), who follow the post-structuralist framework, positioning is ‘the discursive process whereby selves are located in conversations as observably and subjectively coherent participants in jointly produced story lines’ (Davies and Harré 1990: 48).

Using the concept of subject position, Foucault revisited the concept of ‘roles’ – or

‘identities’ within traditional social psychology (Davis and Harré 1990). Whereas the roles were bounded to the modernist notion of the fixed and static self, the notion of subject position presupposes the unfinished and flexible character of the subject’s representation. According to Foucault, one can simultaneously have multiple subject positions as well as refuse to follow the offered discursive lines. An important meaning of subject position is a place taken by a subject in relation to a discourse. Hall uses the example of a woman who must take the position of a ‘male’ desiring voyeur in order to make sense of the discourse of pornography and thus accept the offered ways of representing women (Hall 1997a: 40).

According to Foucault, discourse has the function of ‘capturing’ subjects and they are enacted in the work of social institutions. Therefore, subjects can be also defined as are the products of practices formed within (or of) social institutions of power. In this way, a subject’s symbolic meaning, as well as its materiality, is constantly created and recreated (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1982). Therefore, according to Foucault, subjects can

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be defined as the manifestations of certain discourses; subjected to their power, people become represented in certain ways (Hall 1997a).

Subject, representation and social exclusion

According to Foucault, discourses and representations are not ahistorical, but intrinsically belong to and shift according to major periods in history and systems of knowledge valid in different epochs (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1982). For example, Foucault perceived the very idea of rationality as a specific cultural invention – a discourse belonging to the classical age and continuing through modernity to the present (Foucault 1972; Hall 1997a). The subject or the identity of a rational man, with all his connotations (such as heterosexual gender conduct and loyalty to the morality of the modern age) was produced as the major available position within this discourse.

According to Foucault, the criteria for the subject positions individuals are offered or the way, in which subjects are represented are determined by hegemonic discourses.

Hegemonic discourses show actual power constellations in a society (Foucault 1972).

Hegemonic discourses and representations have normalising effects on subjects, as they can govern people’s behavior and manage populations. Foucault showed how the modernity discourse nomalised the specific representations of the rational man opposing them to the ‘criminal man’, the ‘hysterical woman’, the ‘madman’ and the ‘deviant and sexually perverse person’ (Foucault 1972; Hall1997a). Foucault’s invaluable merit is that he showed that the symbolic sphere of meaning creation and the procedure of representation are integral aspects of the distribution of power and resources in society.

Foucault put forward the conception of power/knowledge, holding that power in society is exercised when more powerful groups of society highlight, invent and prescribe qualities to subjects and groups. The process of constructing the other’s identity can put individuals who are referred to under the representation in an unfavourable social position. Therefore discourses and representations relate to the mechanisms of social exclusion.

Foucault pointed out that some subjects get a second-range status through the procedure of being made visible, through accentuating certain qualities of people in representation.

According to Foucault, there is power in representation, when qualities that deviate

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from normative ideas of right and wrong behaviour are accentuated and when

individuals are subjected to observation (Foucault 1977). Thus, the normalised subject of the Classical age and modernity: the ‘rational man’ (someone who is an incorporation of the rationality discourse) escaped visibility and final judgment. The excluded, accentuated subjects, as the ‘mad man’ and ‘sexually perverse person’, constructed people as ‘others’ in the society; their difference was accentuated in the representation and they were seen as different from the norm. In relation to this, Peters and Besley point out: ‘For Foucault the notion of exclusion operates spatially in the development of all-seeing architectures that permit continual surveillance and separates through dividing practices a series of others who represent a danger to the body of society and must be excluded, studied, observed and treated if and before they can be readmitted to society as normalized citizens’ (Peters and Besley 2014: 102). The same idea is conveyed by Hall when he points out that difference can be fixed in categories such as

‘race’, gender and sexuality in certain negative ways.

Thus, the representations of individuals and groups and their positioning as ‘one of us’

(those who follow the hegemonic norms) or as ‘outsiders’ play a decisive role in the creation of a hierarchical social order. As already mentioned, this idea, from Foucault (1980), has been decisive for Hall’s theory of representation (Hall 1997a, 1997b) and for post-colonial theory (Said 1978). Foucault paid special attention to the way in which modern ideas about morals and sexuality offer specific naturalised representations for subjects defining their positions and governing people’s conduct. In line with Hall (1997b), post-colonial theory criticises the fact that people and ethnicities outside the boundaries of the geographical and symbolic ‘West’ have been represented as weak – as those who should be controlled by education, converted to normalcy and civilised (Said 1978).

Agency and resistance

There is a phenomenon of the internalisation of suppression and the process of becoming a vulnerable or an injured subject (Lock and Strong 2014: 319). Derogative social representations can lead to injury of personal self-respect (Fanon 2008; Honneth 2007; hooks 1992, 1997). However, self-identification in terms of victimhood, which is typical in constructions of vulnerable social groups, is not the only possible basis for the

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development of a common feeling of belonging (hooks 1997). According to hooks (1997), subjects can develop radical consciousness and lead their lives guided by positive beliefs about their ability to resist racist, cultural and economic domination.

Foucault underlined that the process of representation is connected with a struggle over meaning. Power also has positive effects, as it creates certain positions for individuals and allows them to place themselves within alternative storylines (Foucault 1982; Lock and Strong 2014). I share the viewpoint of authors (such as Jackson) who believe that power is dispersed, contingent and unstable (Jackson 1999: 132). It is important to see disadvantaged groups in a dualistic way, both as subordinate to power and as agents who are capable of exercising power by producing alternative representations. In this context, and in accordance with feminist criticism, power and empowerment are used in the generative sense; that is, not as power over others but as power for self-actualisation and social transformation toward a life free of discrimination and domination. Therefore the analysis of the discursive construction of representations not only involves study of the ways in which subjects adopt dominant discourses, but also inquiry into the transformation of dominant representations (Bhabha 1994, 1996; Brah 1992, 1998;

Fairclough 1999).

I proceed from the presupposition that agency is a source of positive self-representation and the capacity to resist hegemonic societal definitions of right and wrong and create alternative (self-)representations (Fairclough 2005). I follow the idea that human agency is expressed through an active (self-)creation realised through linguistic and other means of self-expression. Creation of alternative representations occurs through a critical adoption of dominant discourses (Fairclough 2005). The critical adoption of dominant discourses takes place through a process of negotiation and an inscription of oneself into new storylines (Larsen 2006; Neumann 2001; Staunæs and Søndergaard 2006). An inner psychological ‘core’ of the person gains primary importance in theorising agency as well as collective resistance acts of individuals and the production of new representations and discourses (hooks 1997). This involves a political dimension of representation. Thus, post-colonial feminists have challenged mainstream identity production by questioning the policies of representation, posing the question about who has the authority to present minority women’s and men’s identities (Gouws 1996: 72).

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Intersectionality: Theorising multiple positioning

To explore the way in which categories of gender, sexuality and ethnicity intersect in representations of migrants and how these representations and discourses position subjects in the complex universe of social power relations, I used the theoretical and methodological tool of intersectionality. The concept of intersectionality allows researchers to study the way in which subjects are situated in the complex discursive web of power relations conditioned by specific constellations and intertwinings of class, gender, ethnicity and other axes of power. The idea of intersectionality was developed as a criticism of radical feminism (Echols 1989), which emphasises the destructive effects of patriarchy on women’s lives and social positions. It was introduced by Crenshaw (1989, 1991) and Collins (2000) as a theoretical tool for exploring the way in which various categories of belonging – or signifiers – work together to influence the social positions and life experiences of Black American women. It challenged the limited notion of a one-dimensional universal female subject. Post-colonial feminists established the influential thesis that gender is insufficient as an operational concept for a critical study of women’s social positions, but should be supplemented by the categories of ethnicity and class. The idea was conceptually crystallised by Crenshaw (Crenshaw 1991; Hull et al. 1979), who pointed out that there is a complex positioning of an individual within social structures loaded with power. For example, a minority woman must struggle with racism, colonialism and patriarchy. Thus, according to Collins, different forms of oppression accumulate and become double, triple and multifaceted oppression (Crenshaw 1989). To underline the fact that categories as bearers of discourses have a decisive power over individuals, Collins introduced the concept of the matrix of domination to describe the way in which categories are intertwined and interrelated (Collins 2000). Individual and collective experiences are defined by the necessity to overcome simultaneous and multiple types of domination.

As Collins suggested, these types of oppression intersect or enforce each other’s distractive effects on the lives of Black American women, and also determine specific, complex strategies for liberation and becoming an independent social actor (Collins 2000).

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I agree with Berg, Flemmen and Gullikstad (2010) who advocate that Collins’s approach could be called ‘classical’, or an additive understanding of intersectionality (Collins 2000, 1998; Crenshaw 1989, 1991). Referring to McCall (2005), Berg, Flemmen and Gullikstad defined the classical approach to intersectionality as one that focuses on ‘inter-categorical complexity’ (Berg et al. 2010: 17) and presupposes ontological hierarchy of categories. The ‘classical’, inter-categorical concept of intersectionality is insufficient for understanding the ways in which gender, ethnicity, class and sexuality are negotiated by specific actors (Berg et al. 2010; Brah 2003; Lykke 2003, 2005; Staunæs and Søndergaard 2006). I distance myself from post-colonial conceptions of intersectionality, according to which power over individuals is thought to be accumulated in an additive way and categories of gender and ethnicity should be simply added to each other.

I use the so-called ‘opening’, or intra-categorical understanding of intersectionality put forward by researchers such as Berg, Flemmen and Gullikstad (Berg et al. 2010; Brah 2003; Lykke 2003, 2005; Staunæs 2004; Staunæs and Søndergaard 2006). It is fruitful to study the way in which gender and ethnicity are ‘done’ or performed in concrete situations and contexts. People may describe their gender and ethnicity in many different ways, depending on the contexts in which they use these notions. Instead of understanding experiences and statuses to be predetermined by categories, Berg, Flemmen and Gullikstad (2010) proceeded from the idea that subjects are constructed or represented differently at any time. Individuals might inscribe themselves into new, alternative storylines and subject themselves to different discourses. In this respect the observation of Hall is relevant that race can mean anything, it is a floating signifier.

Thus, Kristensen (2011) asks which meanings are prescribed to gender and ethnicity when individuals activate these categories in their everyday discourse.

This approach can be further described as ‘opening up’, rather than ‘closing’, the categories (Berg et al. 2010: 19). Lykke suggests that we should look at subjects in intersectional terms – as ‘nodal points’ at which many discourses meet (Laclau and Mouffe 1985; Lykke 2005; Staunæs and Søndergaard 2006). The perception of an object as a ‘node within a network’ was coined by Foucault (1980) in The Archaeology of Knowledge. Foucault used the example of a book, which, according to him, is not

In the Creative Space of Inclusion: Gender, Sexuality and Ethnicity in the Representations of Migrants in Norway

Doctoral theses at NTNU, 2015:70

Jana Sverdljuk

In the Creative Space of Inclusion

Gender, Sexuality and Ethnicity in the Representations of Migrants in Norway

Doct or al thesis

Jana Sverdljuk

In the Creative Space of Inclusion

Gender, Sexuality and Ethnicity in the Representations of Migrants in Norway

Thesis for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor

Trondheim, December 2015

Norwegian University of Science and Technology Faculty of Humanities

Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture

Acknowledgements

Contents